


Flutters in the Attic

by deinde_prandium



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Kim is a good dancer, Team Miraculous: fantastic idiot cinnamon rolls, Totographs Zine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-25 01:28:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30081378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deinde_prandium/pseuds/deinde_prandium
Summary: In retrospect, this had all probably been a very bad idea.But in fairness to Max Kanté, he would never have expected that the simple task of snooping on his friend’s dad would have led to being trapped in a hidden attic with a very, very bad moth problem.Max & Kim shenanigans, with a side of Ladrien. Written for the Totographs zine.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Max Kanté & Lê Chiến Kim
Comments: 8
Kudos: 41
Collections: Totographs Zine





	Flutters in the Attic

**Author's Note:**

> My first zine entry! Many thanks to janaikam for convincing me to submit a piece for this amazing collection of stories and art. Thanks also to sukker_sugar and dealan for the initial beta reads, as well as to Kim and Maryssa for their editing work <3

In retrospect, this had all probably been a very bad idea.

But in fairness to Max Kanté, he would never have expected that the simple task of snooping on his friend’s dad would have led to being trapped in a hidden attic with a very, very bad moth problem.

He didn’t say as much aloud, but his friend Kim seemed to agree … at least, about the moth part.

“Dude,” Kim said. “Aren’t these guys supposed to be, like, crazy rich? Do you think they’ve ever heard of an exterminator?”

Max rolled his eyes. “I really don’t think that pest control should be top of mind right now,” he scolded. “The bigger question is, how in the world do we get out of here?”

Kim’s brow furrowed in contemplation, but Max knew better than to assume he was actually on his way to coming up with a solution. True to form, Kim’s next words did not disappoint. “Come to think of it, I _am_ getting a little hungry. The sooner we get back, the better. I saw a mini fridge in Adrien’s room—pretty sure there’s nothing but cheese in there, but food is food.”

“Kim, can you please focus for a moment? We don’t even know how we ended up here.”

“Good point,” Kim conceded.

Max slipped his fingers beneath the lenses of his glasses and rubbed his eyes in exasperation. How _had_ they gotten up here, anyway? It was just supposed to be a quick zip into Mr. Agreste’s office. It wouldn’t have taken Markov more than two minutes to download the contents of Mr. Agreste’s hard drive and schedule, plus another twenty seconds for the malware addition to help them keep track any further movements, and—

Well, Max supposed that listing everything that he’d planned on doing verged on the criminal, but it was the least he could do for Adrien after he’d given up his spot in the Ultimate Mecha Strike III tournament. Adrien deserved more opportunities to escape the tedium of life at home, and if this was—as Nino had argued—the only way to accomplish this, then so be it. Plus, Max was never one to back down from a challenge. Not that it was an actual challenge for those like himself or Markov.

His real mistake, Max realized, had been allowing Kim to tag along. His friend simply could not keep his hands to himself.

Unfortunately, trapped they were, with no way of getting out. Markov, he supposed, was already back in Adrien’s room, but whatever random buttons Kim had pressed had sent them on a Willy Wonka–esque journey through some strange chutes and tunnels in the Agreste mansion. They seemed quite state of the art—something that fascinated Max, despite their current predicament. He wondered if Adrien was aware of their even existing.

Because if he was, a little warning would have been nice.

A little tune Max recognized as his ringtone echoed in the chamber. “Of course!” he said, pulling out his phone. “I can’t believe that in my efforts to devise a rational solution independently, I didn’t consider the benefits of simply requesting assistance from a third party!”

Kim gave him a funny look. “Yeah, but are you gonna answer that?”

“Oh. Right.” Max hit the _Accept_ button on the screen. “Hello?”

“MAX!”

A flurry of moths dispersed into the air at the sound of Adrien’s voice. Adrien peered at them from the screen, his hair standing up in odd directions. Max wondered if his friend had been pulling at it in a panic.

“Where did you and Kim go?” Adrien asked. “Are you okay?”

“We’re fine,” Max assured him. “We just … got lost. I must say, your home is quite an architectural feat.”

“Yeah, but you’ve got a lot of bugs!” Kim interjected.

Adrien scrunched a brow in confusion. “Bugs?”

“Never mind that,” Max said quickly, smacking Kim in the chest for good measure. “The only problem is that we can’t quite figure out how to get back to where we started.”

Adrien frowned. “That’s weird. I thought you said you were going to accompany Kim to the kitchen to ask about a snack.”

“Yes, well …” Max trailed off. Even though they were stuck, he was loath to reveal the full extent of their true activities—plausible deniability and all that. “Anyway, is Markov with you?”

“Yes. He’s the one who told me something was wrong.”

“Okay. Perfect. Excellent. Well, we shouldn’t be too long.” He flipped the camera view to give Adrien a sense of where they were. “From what I can tell, we’re—”

Max cut off his explanation when the screen suddenly blurred and turned dark. From the muffled sounds that followed, he presumed Adrien was hiding his phone in response to the entry of someone into his room.

“My friends?” he could hear Adrien say. “Ah, well, they forgot some books for our project at the library, so they ran over to get them. They’ll be back soon. ... How soon? Um … no more than a few minutes, I’d say. Maybe ten? ... Actually yeah, if you could send some snacks up, I’m sure they’ll really appreciate it. Yes, of course I’ll make sure no one disturbs Father. Thanks, Nathalie!”

Great. So they had ten minutes to escape from this odd metal moth sanctuary and figure out how to locate the secret button that would take them down the secret elevator and back into Mr. Agreste’s office.

When Adrien returned to the call, his expression was even more harried than before. “Listen, Max. I don’t know where you and Kim wandered off to, but wherever you are, you need to figure out your way back as quickly as possible. And whatever you do, don’t disturb my father. Avoid passing in front of his office if you can.”

Max sighed as Adrien abruptly ended the call. Getting back was going to be easier said than done, especially now that Mr. Agreste’s return to his study had effectively blocked off their one way out.

He looked back at Kim, only to find that his companion now appeared to be doing some strange dance in a cloud of white. “What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to shoo them away,” Kim answered, waving the fluttering insects in the direction of the large window at the front of the room. “These people work in fashion! Don’t they know what these things can do to clothes? Trust me, I’m doing them a favor.”

Max quirked a brow at this peculiar scene. As ridiculous as Kim looked, whatever he was doing actually seemed to be working. The moths seemed to have little interest in being chased around and were making a break for an open panel in the window. As Max watched a cluster of them flee into the Paris sky, he took at least some comfort in the discovery of an alternate escape route.

All he and Kim needed was a rope ladder. Or a zip line.

Max’s phone rang once again. When he answered this time, three faces crowded onto the screen: Nino, Alya, and Marinette.

“Nino!” he cried, half in relief, half in frustration. “This is all your fault.”

“My fault?” Nino asked, confused. “What’s even going on? I texted Adrien to say we were on our way, but then he sent me all these panicked messages saying you’re missing … in his house?”

“Yes, we got turned around somehow and ended up in what appears to be an upper attic space near the roof of the Agreste mansion. There is a large circular window in the room, and judging by the placement of the sun, I’d say we are facing northwest. The view is actually rather spectacular.”

Nino’s brow furrowed. “Wait. Did I really just hear you say you’re trapped in an attic?”

“Well, given its size, it’s more like a tower, but yes, that’s right.”

“Weren’t you supposed to be—”

“Snooping through Mr. Agreste’s office on your orders? Why, yes. That is exactly what we were doing,” Max huffed. He looked over at Kim, who was still shooing moths out the window. “And now we have no way of getting back to where we started without getting caught.”

“Bummer, dude.”

“Indeed. It’s too bad that none of us have a direct line to, say, Ladybug or Chat Noir. I prefer to think of myself as self-sufficient, but these are rather extraordinary circumstances.”

Max shook his head as he spoke. What he wouldn’t do to have Kaalki’s assistance on this one.

“Yeah, man, I’m sure Ladybug would definitely help you out with—hey! Marinette! Where are you going?”

Indistinct chatter filtered in from the other side, followed by the sound of someone yelling Marinette’s name—Alya, Max presumed. He just sat and waited patiently through the interruption. After all, he and Kim weren’t going anywhere.

“Sorry about that,” Nino said just a few moments later. “Marinette took off on us all of a sudden. Said she forgot about some cookies we were supposed to bring from her place. Anyway, how can we help?”

Max shook his head at the idea of Marinette running off. Honestly, who thought of cookies at a time like this? It seemed much more likely that she was having second thoughts about being in the same room as Adrien, what with that debilitating crush of hers.

He pushed the thought away in favor of more pressing concerns. “Perhaps you and Alya could find a way to contact Ladybug or Chat Noir on my behalf,” he suggested. “Regardless, when you arrive at the Agreste mansion, can you arrange to send Markov up here? I should be able to figure something out with his help.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Thanks, Nino.” Max hung up and slumped his shoulders with a sigh. There was nothing else to do but wait.

He looked back at Kim, who by this point appeared to have scared the remaining moths away from their habitat.

“There,” Kim said, puffing his chest out with pride as he surveyed the now-empty room. “My good deed for the day is done.”

“What good deed?”

The pair turned to see a red-suited superhero perched on the edge of the window’s open panel.

“Ladybug!” they exclaimed with relief.

“Ran into a friend of yours while I was on patrol,” Ladybug said. “Said you two were snooping around Adrien Agreste’s house and got lost?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Max said tiredly, unwilling to explain himself any more than he had to.

“Don’t worry about it,” she replied with a wink. “Now, how about we get you gentlemen back on solid ground?”

* * *

It was, by all accounts, a thrilling rescue indeed.

In spite of this, Max couldn’t help but feel just the slightest bit nervous. His heart had leapt into his throat when the trio touched down on the steps of the Agreste mansion. Surprisingly, those feelings of anxiety had less to do with the sensation of clinging to Ladybug as they flew through the air—with nothing but the string of a magical yo-yo to keep them from falling to their doom—and more to do with the imposing manner in which Mr. Agreste and his assistant were glaring at them from the entryway.

“What is the meaning of this?” Mr. Agreste demanded. “I expect Adrien’s friends to announce themselves at the gate like everyone else, not simply barrel through like common hooligans.”

Max tugged at the collar of his shirt. He did not consider himself to be a person who was usually at a loss for words, but given the tumult of the past hour, he found himself momentarily unprepared to respond.

Unfortunately, the same could not be said of his friend. Kim stepped forward, the paragon of clueless confidence. “Actually, literally two minutes ago, we—”

“My apologies, Mr. Agreste,” Max cut in, frantically searching his memory for the excuse Adrien had come up with earlier. “We were—we got caught up in an unexpected errand retrieving some materials for the project we’re working on with your son, and Ladybug was kind enough to aid in our hasty return so that we could resume as quickly as possible.”

“And yet, you’re back empty handed,” the woman remarked. It sounded more like an accusation.

Max cast a nervous glance at Adrien, who had just appeared on the scene. He had hoped that his friend might be able to explain the situation away for them; however, judging by the way Adrien was exchanging coy smiles with Ladybug, it was clear that he was far too preoccupied by the superhero’s sudden appearance to be of any real assistance. Max would have to figure this out on his own.

Max sighed. He’d never strung together this many lies before, and he hoped that it didn’t show. “Ah, yes, well … as it turns out, the materials we needed are all available digitally. Such a, um, silly oversight on my part. In any case, we do apologize for the inconvenience of returning in this manner. We were just so grateful to Ladybug for her help, and in such a hurry to get back, that we did not stop to consider the impropriety of bypassing your very impressive security apparatus.”

“Might want to upgrade your pest control capabilities, though,” Kim chimed in, pointing at what appeared to be a puff of white dispersing into the Paris skyline. “While we were up there, we saw a lot of moths hanging out by one of your windows. A whole cloud of them!”

Mr. Agreste’s eyes widened, and Max resisted the urge to smack his friend. He was certain that they were, to put things colloquially, totally busted.

Mercifully, Mr. Agreste didn’t press the issue further. In fact, he dropped the thread of conversation completely. “I see,” he said quietly. “Adrien, see to it that your friends follow the proper protocols the next time they wish to visit. Nathalie, come with me.”

The two adults turned and left without waiting for a reply, whispering feverishly between the two of them. Max thought he heard Mr. Agreste say something about harvesting, but he didn’t feel like it was worth it to inquire. He’d pushed his luck far enough already.

Max turned his attention back to Adrien and Ladybug, who by this point were so deep in conversation that they had not noticed the departure of Adrien’s father—or anything else, for that matter. Indeed, while the art of flirting was one of the few areas in which Max did not profess to claim any expertise, it was not difficult to observe a sweet awkwardness between them that suggested the pair were members of a mutual admiration society. Even if his suspicions about Ladybug were erroneous (something Max found unlikely), Adrien’s general comportment in her presence had made it clear that he was besotted.

Poor Marinette, he thought. Beaten to the punch by a superhero.

“Max! Kim! You’re alive!”

Max whirled around at the sound of his name, only to see Nino and Alya waving at them from the other side of the gate. The latter’s eyes widened when she realized that they weren’t alone. “Wait, is that Ladybug?” she asked. “Ladybug! Hi!”

Ladybug looked up and returned the greeting with a little wave. “I think that’s my cue to go,” she said, twirling a finger through one of her pigtails.

Adrien shuffled from side to side, a shy smile playing at his lips. “I suppose you’ve got places to be, Parisians to save …”

Max could have sworn he’d heard Ladybug _giggle_ in response.

Their little dance surely would have continued had Nino not piped up once again. “Hello? Are you going to let us in, or what?”

“Right,” Adrien said, blushing. “Well ... I’m sure I’ll see you around, Ladybug. Feel free to drop in anytime.”

Ladybug’s cheeks seemed to match her suit. “You too! I mean, I’ll see you soon.”

Kim cut in with a cheerful wave. “Thanks again, Ladybug!”

“Oh! Yes. You’re welcome,” Ladybug replied, appearing to regain her composure. She cast her yo-yo aloft, adding, “Make sure to stay out of trouble, you two.” With a smile, she pulled herself into the air and out of sight.

Adrien let out a sigh as he looked over at the gate and their waiting friends. “Max. Kim,” he said quietly.

Max cringed, bracing himself for the inevitable interrogation.

Adrien surprised him with a grin. “I have no idea what you two did that Ladybug needed to come to your rescue, but … _thank you_.”

* * *

As it happened, getting lost in Adrien’s house had ended up working out fine, after all.

For as much as Max had worried about the prospect of further questioning, no such interrogation ever materialized. To his great relief, the excitement generated by their run-in with Ladybug was such that none of his friends had bothered to press for details on where he and Kim had gone.

More importantly, their unexpected adventure had not prevented Markov from coming through with the information Nino had asked them to gather. Weeks later, the whole gang now stood outside the gates of the Agreste mansion, primed to reap the rewards of their labors.

Max peered up at the facade of Adrien’s home. While their mission had ultimately been a success, the “attic incident,” as he called it, continued to live rent free in his head. If he ever saw Ladybug again, perhaps he’d ask to borrow Kaalki so that he could explore the space in more depth. He really was curious about how that secret elevator worked.

Max tried to push away thoughts of the mysterious room as the gate opened.

“Hey guys!” Adrien said cheerfully. “I’m so glad we could make his work. I’m excited to see this movie!”

Nino shot Max a knowing smile. “Yup. Total coincidence that you didn’t have anything lined up today.” Max nodded absently in acknowledgement.

The group began to move, all smiles and chatter about the afternoon they had planned. Max, however, lingered in place, his eyes still on one of the upper towers.

“Dude, you still thinking about our Tangled experience?” Kim asked. He threw an arm around him, dragging him along to join the rest of their friends. “We were stuck there for like, half an hour, tops. It’s not the life-altering trauma you think it was.”

“No, but—”

“No, but nothing. We made it! Ladybug saved us!” Kim grinned. “And hey, there hasn’t been an akuma attack in almost a month! That’s got to be some kind of record, right? Life is good, man. Let’s enjoy it while it lasts.”

The boys watched as a white moth passed in their field of vision, fluttering free.

“You’re right, Kim,” he agreed. “Life is good.”

Kim tapped his chin thoughtfully. “I do hope they got that exterminator, though. You think we should follow up with Adrien about the whole moth thing?”

Max looked ahead to see their friend smiling shyly at a very flustered-looking Marinette.

“You know what, Kim? Let’s leave that for another day.”

**Author's Note:**

> Make sure you check out the other stories in this collection, because they're amazing!
> 
> I'm deinde-prandium on tumblr. Stop by and say hello :)


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